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    Frank Lloyd Wright's Robie House: The Illustrated Story of an Architectural Masterpiece
    Frank Lloyd Wright's Robie House: The Illustrated Story of an Architectural Masterpiece
    Frank Lloyd Wright's Robie House: The Illustrated Story of an Architectural Masterpiece
    Ebook227 pages1 hour

    Frank Lloyd Wright's Robie House: The Illustrated Story of an Architectural Masterpiece

    By Donald Hoffmann

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    Frank Lloyd Wright firmly believed that "life could be formed anew if new form could be brought to its setting, architecture." His revolt against customary architectural design was shared by rugged individualist Fred C. Robie, who chose Wright to build his dream house in 1908. In this painstakingly researched and illuminating account of the design and construction of the Robie home, a noted architectural authority presents an in-depth study remarkable for clarity and thoroughness.
    At age 28, Robie had become a highly successful businessman who conceived the idea of building a grand home in his native Chicago. He insisted on a design incorporating features that were innovative for the day: hallways and stairwells situated to conserve valuable space, rooms that suggested feelings of airiness, and narrow trimmings on doorways and windows, among others. Robie's wish to shape space as a means of personal expression meshed with Wright's own feelings and spirit. The two strong-willed men formed a perfect union: Robie had found his architect and Wright his ideal client.
    Drawing on revealing family documents, including a 1958 interview with Robie, and a host of other sources, the author has compiled an authoritative photo-history, enabling the reader to witness each stage and various transformations of a landmark of modern architecture. The text is enhanced by 160 carefully selected illustrations, including perspectives and elevations, cross-sectional drawings, floor plans, designs for windows, carpets, lighting fixtures and other furnishings, plus recent and historic photographs. Now students, architects, any lover of fine buildings can watch an architectural masterpiece take shape in this profusely illustrated history of the house Wright himself labeled "a source of world-wide architectural inspiration."

    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherDover Publications
    Release dateJul 12, 2012
    ISBN9780486140261
    Frank Lloyd Wright's Robie House: The Illustrated Story of an Architectural Masterpiece

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    • 5/5
      Frank Lloyd Wright is probably still America's best known and iconic architect with 433 projects listed in Storrer's work catalog. FLW's buildings all share a common look of Japan/Pueblo meets Hobbit romanticism.In this unassuming booklet with plenty of B/W photos and illustrations, Hoffmann distills the essence and principles of FLW's architecture: the horizontal lines hugging the ground, the cantilevered roof freeing walls from structural duties, the integration of buildings in their natural surroundings.While Hoffmann dwells on the importance of the prairie on Wright's style, he neglects in my opinion the influence of Japanese buildings (a culture rediscovered shortly before FLW's birth). A discussion of his near contemporary Walter Gropius who also discovered many of Wright's lessons might have served to illustrate Wright's closeness to the 19th century with his focus on craftmanship and uniqueness. Overall, an excellent primer on Wright.

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    Frank Lloyd Wright's Robie House - Donald Hoffmann

    DOVER BOOKS ON ARCHITECTURE

    ALADDIN BUILT IN A DAY HOUSE CATALOG, 1917, The Aladdin Co. (0-486-28591-X)

    CONCRETE COUNTRY RESIDENCES: Photographs and Floor Plans of Turn-of-the-Century Homes, Atlas Portland Cement Company. (0-486-42733-1)

    BADGER’S ILLUSTRATED CATALOGUE OF CAST-IRON ARCHITECTURE, Daniel D. Badger. (0-486-24223-4)

    BENNETT’S SMALL HOUSE CATALOG, 1920, Ray H. Bennett Lumber Co., Inc. (0-486-27809-3)

    BICKNELL’S VICTORIAN BUILDINGS, A. J. Bicknell. (0-486-23904-7)

    THE GREAT PYRAMID OF GIZA: History and Speculation, James Bonwick. (0-486-42521-5)

    ANCIENT EGYPTIAN CONSTRUCTION AND ARCHITECTURE, Somers Clarke and R. Engelbach. (0-486-26485-8)

    TURN-OF-THE-CENTURY HOUSE DESIGNS, William T. Comstock. (0-486-28186-8)

    THE HOUSE BEAUTIFUL, Clarence Cook. (0-486-28586-3)

    GREAT BUILDINGS OF BOSTON, George M. Cushing, Jr. (0-486-24219-6)

    THE ARCHITECTURAL PLATES FROM THE ENCYCLOPEDIE, Denis Diderot. (0-486-27954-5)

    THE ARCHITECTURE OF COUNTRY HOUSES, Andrew J. Downing. (0-486-22003-6)

    VICTORIAN COTTAGE RESIDENCES, Andrew J. Downing. (0-486-24078-9)

    PRINCIPLES OF VICTORIAN DECORATIVE DESIGN, Christopher Dresser. (0-486-28900-1)

    PALLADIO’S ARCHITECTURE AND ITS INFLUENCE: A Photographic Guide, Joseph C. Farber and Henry Hope Reed. (0-486-23922-5)

    VICTORIAN HOUSES: A Treasury of Lesser-Known Examples, Edmund Gillon and Clay Lancaster. (0-486-22966-1)

    PHILADELPHIA THEATERS: A Pictorial Architectural History, Irvin R. Glazer. (0-486-27833-6)

    117 HOUSE DESIGNS OF THE 20s, Gordon-Van Tine Co. (0-486-26959-0)

    MASTERPIECES OF AMERICAN ARCHITECTURE, Edward Warren Hoak and Willis Humphrey Church. (0-486-42231-3)

    FRANK LLOYD WRIGHT’S FALLINGWATER: The House and Its History, Donald Hoffmann. (0-486-27430-6)

    UNDERSTANDING FRANK LLOYD WRIGHT’S ARCHITECTURE, Donald Hoffmann. (0-486-28364-X)

    HOLLY’S PICTURESQUE COUNTRY SEATS, Henry Hudson Holly. (0-486-27856-5)

    LATE VICTORIAN HOUSE DESIGNS: 56 AMERICAN HOMES AND COTTAGES WITH FLOOR PLANS, D. S. Hopkins. (0-486-43598-8)

    VICTORIAN ORNAMENTAL CARPENTRY, Ben Karp. (0-486-24144-0)

    GOTHICK ARCHITECTURE: A Reprint of the Original 1742 Treatise, Batty Langley and Thomas Langley. (0-486-42614-9)

    THE CITY OF TOMORROW AND ITS PLANNING, Le Corbusier. (Available in U.S. only.) (0-486-25332-5)

    THE OPULENT INTERIORS OF THE GILDED AGE: All 203 Photographs from Artistic Houses, with New Text, Arnold Lewis, James Turner, and Steven McQuillin. (0-486-25250-7)

    THE ARCHITECTURE OF McKIM, MEAD & WHITE IN PHOTOGRAPHS, PLANS AND ELEVATIONS, McKim, Mead, and White. (0-486-26556-0)

    BROADWAY THEATRES: History and Architecture, William Morrison (0-486-40244-4)

    THE BROWN DECADES: A Study of the Arts in America, 1865–1895, Lewis Mumford. (0-486-20200-3)

    PALLISER’S NEW COTTAGE HOMES, 1887, Palliser & Co. (0-486-42816-8)

    A CONCISE DICTIONARY OF ARCHITECTURAL TERMS, John Henry Parker. (0-486-43302-1)

    EMPIRE STYLEBOOK OF INTERIOR DESIGN: All 72 Plates from the Recueil de decorations intérieures with New English Text, Charles Percier and Pierre Fontaine. (0-486-26754-7)

    AN ALBUM OF MAYA ARCHITECTURE, Tatiana Proskouriakoff. (0-486-42484-7)

    SMALL HOUSES OF THE TWENTIES: The Sears, Roebuck 1926 House Catalog, Sears, Roebuck and Co. (0-486-26709-1)

    THE FIVE BOOKS OF ARCHITECTURE, Sebastiano Serlio. (0-486-24349-4)

    TURN-OF-THE-CENTURY HOUSES, COTTAGES AND VILLAS: Floor Plans and Line Illustrations for 118 Homes from Shoppell’s Catalogs, R. W. Shoppell et al. (0-486-24567-5)

    AMERICAN BARNS AND COVERED BRIDGES, Eric Sloane. (0-486-42561-4)

    MORE CRAFTSMAN HOMES, Gustav Stickley. (0-486-24252-8)

    PLANTATIONS OF THE CAROLINA Low COUNTRY, Samuel Gaillard Stoney. (0-486-26089-5)

    FORM AND DESIGN IN CLASSIC ARCHITECTURE, Arthur Stratton. (0-486-43405-2)

    COUNTRY AND SUBURBAN HOMES OF THE PRAIRIE SCHOOL PERIOD, H. V. von Holst. (0-486-24373-7)

    BRIDGES OF THE WORLD: THEIR DESIGN AND CONSTRUCTION, Charles S. Whitney. (0-486-42995-4)

    CALIFORNIA BUNGALOWS OF THE TWENTIES, Henry L. Wilson. (0-486-27507-8)

    Copyright © 1984 by Donald Hoffmann.

    All rights reserved under Pan American and International

    Copyright Conventions.

    Frank Lloyd Wright’s Robie House: The Illustrated Story of an Architectural Masterpiece is a new work, first published by Dover Publications, Inc., in 1984.

    Manufactured in the United States of America

    Dover Publications, Inc., 31 East 2nd Street, Mineola, N.Y. 11501

    Book design by Carol Belanger Grafton

    Library of Congress Cataloging in Publication Data

    Hoffmann, Donald.

    Frank Lloyd Wright’s Robie House.

    Includes index.

    1. Robie House (Chicago, Ill.) 2. Chicago (Ill.)—Dwellings. 3. Wright, Frank Lloyd 1867-1959. 4. Organic architecture—Illinois—Chicago. I. Title.

    NA7238.C4H63 1984 728.8’3’0924 83-7227

    9780486140261

    ACKNOWLEDGMENT

    The house that was built in Chicago for Fred C. Robie is all too familiar as an image and not at all known as a reality. It still stands, but I would not wish to argue that it still truly exists. Because the house today cannot claim to be the primary document of its own history, I have cast parts of this study in the present tense and have prepared many illustrations to rebuild in the mind what has been lost to direct experience. This required the help of many persons. First came Lorraine Robie O’Connor, who left her father’s house when only 16 months old. Today she is a most direct and alert woman; and it was my good fortune to discover also that for many years she has been an acquaintance of my mother’s. Mrs. O’Connor was quick to share her invaluable collection of family documents. Phillips Taylor lived in the house as a young lad for nearly a year. His memories have proved as accurate as they are vivid. The late Jeannette Wilber Scofield, who had lived in the house from the time when she was six until she was 20, was a woman of great spirit and kindness. She helped me in every possible way, even into her last months.

    Richard Twiss has been extraordinarily generous in providing encouragement and information. Hanna Holborn Gray, the president of the University of Chicago, unhesitatingly assured me of the university’s cooperation. In expressing my gratitude to her, to Peter Kountz, who served as a dedicated curator of the Robie house, and to Carl F. Chapman, Rolf Achilles, Rudy Bernal, Calvert Audrain, Michael Boos, M. H. Sullivan and the staff of the university library, I must add that the university, which came to own the house with obvious reluctance, neither initiated nor sponsored this study. It remains one of the ironies of academic life that generations of students were introduced to art history through photographic reproductions while a very great work of art, next to the campus, was allowed to decay and nearly to vanish.

    For their many kinds of help, I thank especially Hermann Pundt, Kenneth Breisch, Curtis Besinger, Robert Kostka, James O’Gorman, Buford Pickens, Jack Quinan, Leonard Eaton, William A. Storrer, Terry Marvel, W. B. Barnard, Joseph T. Dye, Maya Moran, Jean Green, Kathy Roy Cummings, John Vinci, Tim Samuelson, Janet Cyrwus, Tim Barton, Donald Kalec, Walter A. Netsch, Edgar Tafel, Charles Montooth, Bruce Brooks Pfeiffer, Holmes Knaus, Wolfgang Ritschka, Henry Klumb, Adolf Placzek, Irma Robie, Richard L. Tooke, John Zukowsky, Joseph Benson, Kathryn Smith and Valerie Hoffmann, my daughter. George Hoffmann and Alan Hoffmann, two of my sons, made Hyde Park a good place to visit. Edgar Kaufmann, jr., and John Hoffmann, both fine historians, were so kind as to read the manuscript and make helpful suggestions. I am very grateful, too, to the American Council of Learned Societies and to the Graham Foundation for Advanced Studies in the Fine Arts, which supported my research with grants.

    D.H.

    Table of Contents

    DOVER BOOKS ON ARCHITECTURE

    Title Page

    Copyright Page

    ACKNOWLEDGMENT

    Chapter I - FROM CLIENT TO ARCHITECT

    Chapter II - CONDITIONS AND CHARACTER

    Chapter III - PLANS AND CONSTRUCTION

    Chapter IV - FROM THE OUTSIDE IN

    Chapter V - ON THE GROUND FLOOR

    Chapter VI - INSIDE THE GREAT VESSEL

    Chapter VII - THE ROOMS BEYOND

    Chapter VIII - THE MOST IDEAL PLACE IN THE WORLD

    INDEX

    2. Robie’s house at 5757 Woodlawn Avenue, Chicago.

    Chapter I

    FROM CLIENT TO ARCHITECT

    Fred C. Robie liked to ride around Chicago, the city where he was born, in an experimental motorcar of his own making. It was streamlined and snappy, a more sensible car than most of those on the streets today. If the Robie Cycle Car, as he called it, never quite got into production, at least it said that its owner chose not to be taken as an ordinary man [Fig. 1]. Robie had every reason to think that he was going places. His new house in Hyde Park looked very much as if it might be, too [2]. It was sure to be seen someday as a consummate expression of the ideas and ideals of its architect, Frank Lloyd Wright. It was destined to be one of the most famous houses of America and one of the most famous houses of the twentieth century, anywhere.

    Wright had come into his own a few years earlier, just at the turn of the century. The calendar itself must have cried out to such a radical spirit for full proof of good works in the cause of modernism. In 1902 a young man named Francis Barry Byrne went to work for Wright in his Oak Park studio, at the west edge of the city. Byrne stayed until the summer of 1908, not long before Wright planned the house for Robie. As an old man, Byrne loved to look back to that time:

    The years I worked under Frank Lloyd Wright were those which saw the emergence of that greatest of his contributions to a living architecture, a unique, vital, and relevant building plan which was to become a source factor in European modernism, and the unification of this vital plan with an equally vital building mass and detail. It was a period which marked the passing from his work of Sullivanesque remnants and the appearance of his own uniquely beautiful architecture in relative completeness. The culmination of this happy period in his life as an architect was the Robie house.¹

    1. Fred

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